Some Paintings

For three weeks now, my art table has been covered with pastels, colored pencils, paint, my sketchbook, collage bits... I admit, I kind of what to sew something, but I have no place to do it. The table has been completely given over to Pages and Paint for the duration, so I can work on things in ten-minute increments if need be. Last week we moved out of the sketchbook and onto gessobords, which are pretty cool but unfortunately I can't find them locally. The ones I'm using here are 6x6 inches. (I can find really big, deeply cradled, $30 and up gessobords locally. Not so helpful!)

So last week we started off with a two-minute prompt game, which is also in Sarah's book. The idea is to help you approach a blank page, canvas, board, whatever--to start making a mark. All the prompts go into a bowl, you pull one out, set the timer (I used my new cell phone!) for two minutes, do what it says, and then repeat with another prompt. I struggled with this. Firstly, I am usually pretty loose when I go down there, because it's all play for me. It's not my job, and I approach this for what it is--fun--like I do with my kids. But this game seemed to shut that off. I think it was a combination of the timer, the precise directions, and the fact that some of the prompts just don't apply to me. Paint with a color I don't like? That one stumped me. And some of my favorite loose activities to do weren't included. The prompts are things that specifically work for Sarah, I'm guessing, and some worked for me and some didn't. I think I will use this "game" in the future when I need an entry point, but I will replace some of the prompts and add in some things I need to work on (leaving white space!) and some things I really enjoy (printing with found materials).

But anyway, this is the first "game" piece that I did.

"The Evolution of Useful Things"

I didn't add anything to this when I was finished "playing." Goodness, it's pretty full as it is.

This is another of the game pieces, but I added in a few more collage materials afterwards (which was a bonus assignment this week). I wasn't sure about this one at first, but it's growing on me.

"When Good is Better Than Best"

I think those gear-looking circles were added later too. I was trying to see how different pencil-type things would write over paint, and I did those with a graphite block, which worked much better than a regular pencil. Then right before I added in some of the extra collage pieces I went over the graphite with yellow oil pastel.

This last one was not a game piece. I wanted to incorporate a sketch I made of my daughter playing on the beach, and this is the result.

"A Day at the Beach"

I am still working on using collage materials--it just doesn't come naturally to me to layer in these different components, but I'm trying. In this one, the sails, bucket, sea shell, and the number "3" (my daughter's age, and what she calls "my number") are collaged in.

I am thinking I will have knitting to share in my next post. Meanwhile, I am managing to do some sort of art-making every day. Somebody mentioned in the class discussion group that it supposedly takes three weeks to set a habit, and we're there! That is an excellent thing, the habit of daily art-making, and one of the hoped-for results when I signed up for the class.